The Fabled "Green Jacket" is the Least of Our Worries

Suppose you cared as much about preserving the environment as you did about shaving strokes off your average golf round.
Where would you turn for solutions and inspiration?
It may come as a surprise to learn that certain courses go the extra mile to ensure that their water usage and upkeep measures and landscaping habits are friendly to the local ecology. Magazines like Links and Golf, in fact, keep running lists of the golf destinations that give “green” a whole new meaning.
Tracking down ways to do your part to help Mother Earth sustain us isn’t easy. And the validity of all the “eco-conscious” golf goods and services claim is tough to verify.
Still, if you’re the average player who cares about the future of the game and whether the planet can afford to sustain it, the options are worth exploring. Right?
Here are a few humbly submitted suggestions. If you know of alternative ways to play golf with a “green” mindset, we’re all ears…
SLIVERS OF HOPE: The Eco Golf Company claims that some 2 billion golf tees are put in play every year in the U.S. That’s a lot of wood and plastic being plugged into the ground, smacked around and (often) forgotten. Eco offers a variety of tees (sold in bulk) made from fibers that are meant to degrade as naturally as potato peels over time. Instead of defacing the grounds, they’re meant to incrementally enhance them. Visit the Indiana-based company’s web site for product and pricing details.
PLOP PLOP, FIZZ FIZZ: What golfer hasn’t found himself out at sea, atop a mountain or even snowbound and felt the urge to strike a ball out where there are no boundary lines. The Eco company asserts that it’s got an answer for those who can’t fight the temptation; though they probably realize the average ball shot without regard for where it lands could pose short-term health-threats to creatures, and long-term damage to the planet. The Eco Golf Ball is designed specifically for a short iron shot out into nature’s nether reaches, where, under optimal exposure to water, they’ll dissolve within a week . Again, visit Eco for details.
TRULY GRINDING: Alternatively, the Dixon Earth company markets golf balls that perform adequately on the course and are touted to be made of materials that are “100 percent recyclable”.